Thursday, December 17, 2009

Did you pack that Mac?

So here's the background.

American Jewish blogger lives in Arab country. Has anti-Jewish photos on camera. Has anti-Israel photos on camera. Has hand-written map of Jerusalem in bag. Has Arabic stickers on Mac (not PC) laptop. Has Arabic keyboard on Mac. Has Palestinian booklets in bag. Has apparently cocky attitude.

Blogger believes that Israelis shoot Palestinian children every day. Really.

Blogger goes to Israel border to enter Israel.

Guards see handwritten map of Jerusalem with central bus station marked off, guards see anti-Israel photos, guards see Arabic stickers stickers on laptop American clearly purchased/received in Arab country, guards see passport stamps from enemy countries, guards see indications of terrorist or terrorist dupe.

Warning bells go off.

Guards think, did naive or anti-Israeli American receive Mac from terrorist in Arab country, given map describing where to bring it?

Blogger carefully separated from Mac.

Blogger told to wait, but then wanders off without Mac, leaving Mac unattended.

Conclusions: This story should be publicized to show the efficiency, alertness, and wariness of Israeli border security. It will help discourage attempts to smuggle in bombs through naive American tourists. It will help discourage anti-Israeli naive tourists from visiting Israel.

Going to Israel?Now get 2 phones for the price of 1 (and free calls too) with Talk'n'Save.

That's not quite what happened. She simply left her bag unattended. The team that blew it up had no idea about the other stuff you mentioned. Other than the cool images of the messed up Mac, this is a non-story.

Had Israel treated Rachel Corrie that way, she may still be alive instead of a pancake.

Had Rachel Corrie not played catch with tense soldiers and an armor-plated caterpillar in a war zone, while her ISM co-conspirators did their damndest to create an incident, the stupid woman might have still been alive. It is her companions who are to blame for what happened in any case.War zone, dummy - NOT a safe place to play at middle-class revolutionary.

Frankly, anonymous, I have no sympathy whatsoever for any of the member of the ISM and similar organizations. I hope Paul Larudee is the next one flattened. Heck, put three bullets in the bastard to keep him from wiggling while a tank goes over him. Twice.

And you, you "anonymous' troll, also deserve the same fate. As do Rachel Corries' loathsome parents and fanclub.Get stuffed, dill head.

It sounds like way overkill on the part of border police. The standard procedure for a suspect computer is to ask the owner to turn it on. Why didn't they just ask her to do that if they suspected a bomb?

It sounds like a pissed off guard got carried away. This is not how they regularly deal with suspect computers where they know owns it (and therefore, it couldn't have really been a chafetz chashud).

It would be helpful to explain to those who aren't familiar with life in Israel that all suspicious packages left in public places are promptly blown up in a controlled manner by the police, after the are is cordoned off and the owner doesn't show up.

I personally had my army bag ("chimodan") blown up at the central Jerusalem bus station after I forgot it inside the bus (3 weeks on sentry duty with 3-4 hours of sleep per day turns one into a forgetful zombie). Thankfully it contained only dirty laundry and uniforms. When I came back to get it from the lost and found the next day the bag looked like a mortar had landed on it.

I have no idea what happened to the woman's Mac and have no intention of sifting through all the mean-spirited and ignorant posts of the woman in question to find out. But if she left the computer unattended it shouldn't surprise anyone that it was blown up.

IF all the story is is that she left her computer unattended, then this blog is, indeed, propaganda. She's got every right to complain about her property being destroyed, and is all the more likely to if she already holds certain prejudices against Israel.